Mentally ill patients were treated as badly as beaten, even executed, as a small part of the harsh medieval life. Let’s try to learn about medieval life to see how harsh they had to live.
In the Middle Ages, women were not allowed to choose their mate. They don’t even know the man who will marry before they get married. These are loveless and arranged marriages. This is a corner of medieval life where women were the main victims.
Strange time calculation. In the Middle Ages, people divided a day into 7 equal hours. Since summer days are longer than winter, 1 hour in summer is about 60 minutes long while 1 hour in winter is about 150 minutes long.
The prison system is “hell on earth”. Prisoners were often confined in towers or castles. Many inmates are not given food or water, nor are they allowed to do any activities outside of their cells or to be exposed to the sun. As a result, many prisoners died of starvation or disease.
Medieval mental patients were treated like dirt. Mentally ill people are often beaten as punishment for committing bizarre, eccentric acts. Even sick people were sent to prison or executed because they were believed to be possessed by demons.
The Medieval people used foods that were rich in fat and unhealthy. Medieval people ate a lot of bread, poor quality meat (mostly pork) but high in fat. Meanwhile, people have a serious shortage of fruits and vegetables in their diets.
Medicine is largely based on superstition. Medieval medical diagnoses were often based on astrology and crazy theories. Among them, blood transfusion is considered to be one of the most effective treatment methods. Accordingly, doctors believe that removing “bad blood” from the body will make the patient completely cured.
In the early 1400s, young aristocrats often wore tights or corsets to have small waists, muscular muscles, and to show off their attractive bodies.
The average life expectancy of people in the Middle Ages was much lower than it is today. Accordingly, the average life expectancy of men in the period 1276 – 1300 is about 31 years old.